


Alike

by editorbit



Series: Jerome & Jeremiah Character Studies(?) [18]
Category: Gotham (TV)
Genre: Character Study, Gen, Get it?, One Shot, Pre-Laughing Toxin Jeremiah Valeska, ft. lila & alCOhol
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-23
Updated: 2019-12-23
Packaged: 2021-02-26 00:22:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,236
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21924352
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/editorbit/pseuds/editorbit
Summary: Since the beginning of time - their time - they have looked the same.
Relationships: Jeremiah Valeska & Jerome Valeska, Jeremiah Valeska/Jerome Valeska
Series: Jerome & Jeremiah Character Studies(?) [18]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1514969
Comments: 3
Kudos: 17





	Alike

It had been such a blessing, Jeremiah thinks as he stands before the mirror. Since the beginning of time - their time - they have looked the same. Same red hair atop of their heads. Same eyes. Same features. There hadn’t been a person in Jeremiah’s life at the circus who hadn’t mistaken them for one another at some point or another. Jeremiah didn’t blame them. Back then they’d been practically identical. Their own mother hadn’t even always been able to tell them apart - by looks alone. 

It had been nothing but fun when they were little. Mornings were spent tricking their mother by showing up out of nowhere in seemingly impossible ways, because how could Jerome be out here playing when he had just been inside eating breakfast? Days spent tricking the others at the circus, Jeremiah seemingly showing up and disappearing like he had teleported. Nights spent tricking random circus guests, which often resulted in a few bills or coins later spent on sweets or popcorn.

Sometimes they even dressed like each other, switching lives almost. They watched as no one even batted an eye at Jerome, dressed in Jeremiah’s favourite sweater, as he sat and drew outside or at Jeremiah as he strolled around the trailer with a stick he found somewhere, acting as if he was having a show for an imaginary crowd. Not even their own mother had noticed. Not even as she had kissed Jerome goodnight on the cheek, dressed in Jeremiah’s sweater, clutching Jeremiah’s drawing supplies to his chest and looking at her with Jeremiah’s smile on his face. Jeremiah had gotten a smile. Off they had went to switch again. Jeremiah lied down in his own bed and Jerome lied down on his. A new day had followed like any other. A goodnight kiss had been placed on Jeremiah’s cheek.  
Thinking back on days like these, Jeremiah figures they had been quite different even back then, yet more alike than ever. As Jerome would say, they’d always be like that, alike. Inside and outside. Jeremiah just had a harder, thicker outer layer hiding his inside, the core of his being, his true self. He himself was more of an open book.

As the years passed it had been an inconvenience. A mild annoyance. A bother. As years went by everyone’s distaste for Jerome grew. Jeremiah doesn’t dwell on the reasons. He just doesn’t. No longer did Jeremiah press his lips in a thin line to suppress the giggles threatening to spill or the smile beginning to form. It wasn’t funny anymore. Rather than accidental laughter, panicked explanations spilled from his lips as he moved away before she could put her hands on him. Because he wasn’t Jerome. He was Jeremiah. Sweet little Jeremiah who hadn’t done anything wrong. 

He often managed to stop her before she did anything not intended towards him, but not always. Their mother drank. She sometimes had when they were younger, a little wine here, a little wine there, but sometimes soon became often as the years passed. A little here and there became a lot all at once. And no matter how different Jerome and Jeremiah looked the days she drank, she could never tell them apart. More often than not was it when drunk their mother hurt Jerome. 

Harsh words were spat in Jerome’s face like curses. Hands clutched Jerome’s arms in bruising grips. Palm came in contact with Jerome’s cheek and the sound echoed loudly in the trailer. Jerome was a little devil of a son, she’d say. Jerome was always out doing bad things, she’d say. Jerome deserved nothing of what she gave her, she’d say. The roof above his head, the food on his plate, her - nonexistent and, if otherwise, forced and fake - love, all of it. Their uncle treated him just the same, calling him nothing but a mistake. Their mother would turn to Jeremiah a moment after, half-empty drink in one hand while the other stroked his cheek. The smell of alcohol hit his nostrils as she opened her mouth to mutter the few words of care and affection she had to Jeremiah. Her sweet little boy, in the words of Jerome. Jerome had wore an expression of distaste as he had spoken the words.  
Though the boy she uttered these words to wasn’t always Jeremiah, like she thought. Sometimes their roles were switched. Sometimes Jerome was the one looking into their mother’s glazed over eyes and listening to her sweeter words. Sometimes Jeremiah was the one looking into their mother’s cold eyes and listening to her poisonous words. The words and actions weren’t intended towards him, yet that never made it all hurt any less. 

Sitting there, in his new house, with his new life and new family, Jeremiah had thought, finally no one would ever mistake him for Jerome ever again. Never again would he face the consequences of Jerome’s actions. Never again would the name Jerome be associated with Jeremiah. Jeremiah wasn’t Jeremiah anymore, but Xander Wilde. Xander Wilde didn’t have any brother. 

Oh how wrong he had been, he thinks as he stares through his new, very much fake, glasses and into those familiar eyes in the mirror. A mere moment after the case of their mother’s murder had been solved it had happened. It had been a normal day in his new normal life at his normal school filled with normal people, until someone had uttered those dreadful words.  
The murder had been in all the papers. Who could have killed this innocent woman, they had all said. Jerome, Jeremiah had thought the moment he’d seen it. Who else, but Jerome? And he’d been right, of course he had. Days later the pictures of their dead mother’s body were replaced with mugshots. Jerome’s face was everywhere. Jerome was on the counter in the kitchen, in front of his new parents eyes. Jerome was in every store for every person in there to see. Jerome was at school in the hands of his classmates.

"You know, you kind of look like him," someone had said. It had taken him a moment to get what they were talking about, but then it had dawned on him. The roof above them might as well have fallen right on him. He wish it had. Oh how he wish it had. Though, preferably on his classmate holding the paper. All the material of the roof had hopefully destroyed the paper. 

"Oh, really?" Jeremiah had said, lips forming a straight line and tone uninterested, yet with a hint of annoyance. 

"You might as well be twins," someone else had said. Jeremiah’s chest had been slowly but surely filled with annoyance. Annoyance soon became rage. "Really? How funny," Jeremiah had replied through gritted teeth and tone audibly annoyed. "Let me see." He’d grabbed the paper right out of their hands, stared into those familiar eyes much like the ones he sees in the mirror and he’d ripped it. Ripped it into little pieces. Ripped it until Jerome’s face was nothing but small pieces of paper in different colours. Ripped it until it was unrecognisable and unreadable. 

It became nothing but a curse, looking just like him, like Jerome. Luckily, he thinks, gaze falling to rest on the newspaper on the bathroom counter. Jerome’s mugshot. Jerome’s new mugshot. 

They‘re nothing alike now. No one can ever mistake him for Jerome ever again.


End file.
